The Lord Jesus came to His disciples on the day of His resurrection as the pneumatic Christ. The Greek word for “Spirit” in John 20:22 is pneuma, a word that also means breath or air. In John 1 Christ is the Lamb, but in John 20, after His death and in His resurrection, He is the pneumatic Christ. To say that Christ is the pneumatic Christ means that He is full of the divine breath. Whereas in John 1 Christ came as the Lamb, in John 20 He came as the pneuma. The fact that He breathed into the disciples and told them to receive the Holy Spirit indicates that He had come to them as the breath, the pneuma. The Lord became the pneumatic Christ through resurrection, and today, in resurrection, He still comes to us as the Spirit, the pneuma.

After the Lord Jesus came in John 20:19, there is no word or hint in John’s record indicating that the Lord left the disciples. The reason for this is that He stayed with them, although they were not conscious of His presence. Instead of leaving them, He disappeared, becoming invisible. But to the surprise of the disciples, at various times and in different places He would appear, manifesting Himself to them. Acts 1:3 tells us that to the apostles “He presented Himself alive after His suffering by many convincing proofs, through a period of forty days, appearing to them.” His appearing does not mean that He ever left them; it simply means that He made His presence visible to them.

After appearing to His disciples for a period of forty days, the Lord Jesus ascended to the heavens. Ten days later, on the day of Pentecost, He, having again received the consummated Spirit, poured out this Spirit upon all His disciples.

At this point we need to consider the difference between the essential Spirit and the economical Spirit. The essential Spirit is for the believers’ spiritual life, living, existence, and being, and the economical Spirit is for God’s economy, work, and move. On the day of His resurrection the Lord Jesus breathed the Spirit into the disciples essentially as life for their spiritual existence. Then fifty days later, on the day of Pentecost, Christ, in His ascension, poured out the consummated Spirit upon His disciples economically as power for their work.

In the Lord’s resurrection, the Spirit of resurrection life is likened to breath, breathed into the disciples for their spiritual being and living essentially. In the Lord’s ascension, the Spirit of ascension power, poured out upon the disciples, is symbolized by wind for the disciples’ ministry and move economically (Acts 2:2). The essential Spirit of resurrection life is for the believers to live Christ; the economical Spirit of ascension power is for them to carry out His commission.

We need to see clearly the difference between the breathing in John 20 and the blowing in Acts 2. The breathing in John 20 is for the imparting of the life-giving Spirit into the believers essentially for their spiritual being and for their spiritual living. But the blowing in Acts 2 is for the pouring out of the economical Spirit of power upon the believers, who have already received the essential Spirit into them. The pouring out of the Spirit of power is not for the believers’ spiritual being or living; rather, the outpouring of the Spirit of power is for the believers’ ministry and move. Therefore, the essential aspect of the Spirit is for living, and the economical aspect is for ministry.
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